One of the readings we had this week was "The Art of Bootstrapping" by Guy Kawasaki [http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/01/the_art_of_boot.html#axzz19dBNaSsa] and I was frankly in awe of him after reading the article. It completely shatters the norm of how a business is run and makes a very good case of doing it differently. For example, he says "Ship, then test" which means you do not need to have a perfect product to be able to ship it to your customers. This is completely the opposite of what I had thought before, that a company should perfect their product so that their customers aren't disappointed. But frankly, what is perfect and who defines perfection? Its impossible to satisfy everyone. But sending out a product that is usable makes complete sense in terms of a startup. The other points and examples in the article too make complete sense from a startup perspective and is something I will keep in mind for LUVwater.
In relation to startups I also read another article on the founder of Curalate and how the failure of his previous venture led to the creation of Curalate [http://www.fastcompany.com/3028609/bottom-line/how-curalate-turned-a-dud-into-a-dynamo]. This article ties in heavily with implementation planning as the founder had calculated that they had just a months worth of money left to burn and he had taken the decision of closing the company and brainstorming other ideas which led to Curalate. I liked that the founder himself had the guts to call his own idea "dead" as normally that does not happen and founders are not ready to give up on something thats not working.
LUVwater's implementation plan follows a very standard product development plan as it is a product that requires a lot of iterative quality testing, user testing and it has to follow the governments requirements for safe drinking water. According to the plans I have drafted up, it should take about a year to make it including government testing. The product will be designed and developed keeping manufacturing standards in mind with a prototype supplier (I'm not sure this is the correct term) and by using technologies that already exist so that time to market is minimum. Before the product is completely finished i.e just sent to EPA for testing we would go all out selling the product and trying to get it adopted for a beta release. Again this will reiterate back to a beta test two following another cycle of testing which will finally lead to the final stable product.
Obviously, its impossible to predict everything accurately but this is the best way to prepare for the future.
In relation to startups I also read another article on the founder of Curalate and how the failure of his previous venture led to the creation of Curalate [http://www.fastcompany.com/3028609/bottom-line/how-curalate-turned-a-dud-into-a-dynamo]. This article ties in heavily with implementation planning as the founder had calculated that they had just a months worth of money left to burn and he had taken the decision of closing the company and brainstorming other ideas which led to Curalate. I liked that the founder himself had the guts to call his own idea "dead" as normally that does not happen and founders are not ready to give up on something thats not working.
LUVwater's implementation plan follows a very standard product development plan as it is a product that requires a lot of iterative quality testing, user testing and it has to follow the governments requirements for safe drinking water. According to the plans I have drafted up, it should take about a year to make it including government testing. The product will be designed and developed keeping manufacturing standards in mind with a prototype supplier (I'm not sure this is the correct term) and by using technologies that already exist so that time to market is minimum. Before the product is completely finished i.e just sent to EPA for testing we would go all out selling the product and trying to get it adopted for a beta release. Again this will reiterate back to a beta test two following another cycle of testing which will finally lead to the final stable product.
Obviously, its impossible to predict everything accurately but this is the best way to prepare for the future.
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